Plum Community Center may be closed to visitors, but its programs are still very much open to the public.

Center Executive Director Karen Hochberg said her facility, which serves between 70 to 80 seniors a week, has been closed since mid-March due to the covid-19 pandemic.

That means no cafeteria, in-person exercise and wellness classes, card games or simple camaraderie with the community. Some staffers also work from home most days due to a lack of visitors.

“It is lonely,” Hochberg said. “I’ve staggered the staff. There’s no sense of them being here if there’s no people here. But we’ve been able to do a lot from home moving things online. Some days it seems like we’re more busy than when we were open because we were in such a normal routine.

“We miss people. When we do the wellness calls, we really are concerned about some folks that used to come for lunch.

”We talk on the phone a lot to people right now who are lonely and used to come to the center.”

Some of its free programs continue virtually such as the Silver Sneakers workout sessions. Instructors Sonja Iverson and Anne Skeepen teach a variety of fitness classes via Zoom. Classes are 9:45 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

The center also offers Zoom cooking classes and lectures from the Community College of Allegheny County.

Hochberg said technical support is available for seniors having trouble logging on.

One of its major programs, Meals on Wheels, continues to serve many residents weekly.

Being able to keep that effort going has been an emotional boost for servers as well as recipients, according to the center director.

“It was very comforting to come here and do packaging for Meals on Wheels,” Hochberg said. “Getting our meals out and figuring how to deliver them safely. We bought bags and delivered them to our clients. We moved to all frozen meals.

We used to deliver Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Now we just do Mondays and Wednesdays because I needed to make sure that my staff was safe.”

It is a contactless delivery with volunteers bringing meals to the doors of participants.

The center’s stroke support group meets at 11:30 a.m. Thursdays on the patio at the Plum American Legion, 7824 Saltsburg Road.

The Plum center also partnered with other community centers in Allegheny County to have phone bingos.

For more information on center programs call 412-795-2330 or go online to plumcommunitycenter.com.

Hochberg said there are plans to bring people back to the center by appointment in January.

In the meantime, the center will receive some upgrades in the form of painted walls, new flooring, water bottle refill stations and hand sanitizers. Tables were moved to accommodate a smaller socially distanced crowd once the center reopens.

Copyright ©2025— Trib Total Media, LLC (TribLIVE.com)